John Cornyn

In a blunt assessment, Cornyn said the state party is dysfunctional, as evidenced by the small slice of the electorate who voted in the May 26 runoff.

“They need to decide: Do you want to actually win or are you putting on a performance to the keyboard warriors on social media?” Cornyn said. “The simple fact is that unless you can win elections you can't govern and you become irrelevant and it seems to me that's the path they're headed on right now.”

As the Senate wrapped up its work for the week, Cornyn, 74, said Republicans remain vulnerable on the economy, citing high gas prices and stubborn inflation driven in part by the conflict with Iran.

“Standards of living are going down all across the country,” Cornyn said. “While I support the president's efforts to pacify the Iranian regime, the fact that we're not talking about or focused on the things that most people care about at election time, kitchen table issues…is a problem.”

“The recent polling, very worrisome, including places like Ohio,” Cornyn said. “A lot of races that shouldn't be in play are in play and, you know, Texas is one example of that.”

“It sends a terrible message for Democrat or Republican to act like they should be treated differently from everybody else,” he said. “I just don't think voters accept that.”

“I'm not going to be a thorn in his side intentionally, but I'm also not going to go out of my way to try to appease him,” Cornyn said. “A lot of us have bent over backwards trying to get along and obviously that doesn't make any difference to him at all.”